PajamaMan...

Wednesday, June 13

PajamaFuture: Some Joost for your Tube

A sister site of PajamaNation called PajamaFuture among others predicts the scenario for micropreneurs of 2030 (some 20+ years from today)... Yes, we're young, but we are as visionary as Malaysia Vision 2020, and we're upbeat about technologies...

PajamaFuture on "2030: THE WORLD DIVIDED IN CLANS":

John Naisbit was right:the more we integrate structures at the top (EU, WTO, OECD), the more elements disintegrate at the base. The boundaries of 150 nations will no longer matter in 2030, because the world will be a grand reservoir, in which the European Union only plays a minor part.

Our cities will have become a brand. For some time, the power used to be in the hands of the cities (the heirs of the industrial revolution) and the villages (home-ground of the farmers), but their power has flown into a new form of über-space: the ‘community’. Pioneers of this process were the ‘hoods’ of New York (short for ‘neigbourhoods’), the ‘arrondissements’ of Paris, the ‘zones’ of London (short for postal zones) and the quarters of Amsterdam. The community can be a street, a domain, an apartment building, a company department (corporate hoods) or a virtual community. There are microgeographic area maps full of numbers for future use: telephone zones, satellite footprints, internet addresses, wiring and cable infrastructure. There are ten thousands of such community disctricts over the world and every second another one arises.

These communities have developed their own identity. They have a residence network (urban grids) on a large broadband cable that they divide over several neighboorhood habitants each with their own large antennas and beamers that supply them with wifi. The communities, primarily consisting of homeworkers, are governed by community committees, the so-called ‘guilds’.

Faith Popcorn (the Popcorn Report) called this phenomenon ‘clanning’: ‘belonging to a group that represents common feelings, causes, or ideals; validating one’s own belief system.’ There are communities solely for seniors which have been extra secured with surrounding parks; there are areas for women that don’t allow men; coming-out neighboorhoods for gay people; artist neighboorhoods with an evening curfew for non-artists; and youth areas where parents are not allowed in university campus grounds.

Likewise, TV has no borders anymore... YouTube became a phenomenon in 2006 having been bought for USD 1.6-Billion by Google. In 2006 alone, YouTube consumed more bandwidth than the whole world combined in 2000! Since 2004, there have been plethora other YouTube-like services, and some even tried to revive the streaming services as popularized by the likes including RTM back in 1996! And in case you haven't heard, YouTube has indeed gone to TV beginning this month, thanks to its integration with the iTunes that powers the Apple TV.

From Apple PR:CUPERTINO, California–May, 30, 2007–Apple® today announced that it’s bringing the Internet’s most popular originally-created content from YouTube to the living room with Apple TV™. Beginning in mid-June, Apple TV will wirelessly stream videos directly from YouTube and play them on a user’s widescreen TV. Using Apple TV’s elegant interface and simple Apple Remote, viewers can easily browse, find and watch free videos from YouTube in the comfort of their living room.

Yes I know... C'mon Steve Jobs: Can you let us Malaysians have the Apple TVs for well under RM1K each? (They retails for RM 1,259 a piece today -- more than the amount of moolah many Malaysians make, per month). And bring iPhones quick to Malaysia!! You're killing us with all these teasers... For now, we Malaysians have to settle with burning torrented MPeg4s onto DVDs (flying coasters) and play 'em on our archaic TV sets.

In January 2007, I started learning about another tube of the future called Joost (from the founders of Skype, another billion-dollar acquision for tech giants -- eBay specifically in this case), off the posts/emails in SlashDot. Three months later, an invite from Joost arrived in my mailbox to become a member of its small but fast-growing community of beta testers. My poor broadband package from Streamyx however can't seems cope with the connectivity requirement throughout April and May 2007, even after I upgraded from the 512Kbps to the "1Mbps" plan back in March -- the shows were pausing/buffering erratically, so, I gave up and settled with other streaming services, particular Malaysia-based ones or predownload-based iTunes because even YouTube and the many streamings from overseas were too NOT-LIVE for me.

Today however, after I downloaded the latest release of Joost Beta, the Joost runs just like how a TV of the future should be! It's worth mentioning that there's another VOD service offered by a Malaysia-based company offerings streamings including live shows from TV in Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand -- which I really love by the way!, but Joost simply is a completely different innovative animal. The user interface seems to come from the future lab of Google, and the channels are aplenty, and seems very customizable, unlike the ones from traditional TV stations of RTM, Media Prima etc, or even of Astro Satellite TV subscription! The full screen version is also very interactive complete with add-on "gadgets" capability including Google Chat that lets you chat with other Googlers while enjoying your shows.

Is the world ready for borderless Tube? Not for some governments indeed. Several countries have blocked YouTube on separate incidents. Late last month, I've heard that SingTel blocked Joost... Wise move by these fearful-of-things-you-cannot-compete-with corporations and governments? Very argumentative indeed!

As long as the government and broadband providers will honor their words to bring decent broadband to citizens/customers like me, I'll continue enjoying what YouTube, Joost and their likes have to offer...

From Joost.com:

Joost isn't just about watching TV on your own. We've built in some cool features that let you chat with other channel viewers, talk to your friends in our instant messaging program (compatible with Gmail and Jabber) and even tell the world what you think of shows by rating them while you're watching. With Joost, you can share the TV experience in ways never possible before.

We also want to make it easy and fun for you to share Joost with the rest of the world. If you've got a blog or website, you can add Joost logos and screenshots to it easily. Soon, we'll have lots of other ways to spread the word. Become a Joost evangelist today!